captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> yang: good evening, i'm john yang. judy woodruff is ay. on the newshour tonight, wallet stre takes another plunge: a volatile day leaves the stock market down more than 1100 points, the largest one-day point drop ever. then, republicans are split on what the nunes memo means fores the russia igation, while we take a look at how russia's cyber tactics played into calls for its release. plus, five months afte hurricane harvey slammed into houston, city officials face the task of rebuilding the city to withstand the next s >> we need to turn this area into much more green space. sometimes you have to look at mother nature and say mother nature wins. >> yang: all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour

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real-life conversations in a new language, like spanish, french, >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> yang: it's been a long, strange day on wall street. the sell-off that hit friday, whipsawed the market again.

in one furious, 15-minut stretch, the dow industrials dropped, then recouped 700 points. it ended with a loss of 1,175, f ish at 24,345. that's more than 4.5%, the most since 2011. 11e nasdaq fell 273 points, and the s&p 500 gave u we try to sort some of this out w, with gillian tett, u. managing editor at the "financial times," where she is also a markets and finance columnist. and diane swonk, chief economist for grant thornton in chicago. thank you both for joining us. diane, let me begin with you. at happen today? >> well, what we're starting to see the reality finally starting to hit in the fact the markets were priced to perfection and the economy is not perfect. we saw a euphoria almost like 1999 out there with thiris roa stock market but we've got a

21st century econo economy that's doing well but it also has a price to stronger owth and that's higher interest rates. that's something the mar hadn't counted on is not only are we going to see inflation going forward but with the warming trend in wages, we will also see higher long-term interest rates and that's a co of a better economy.il >> yang:an tett, reality setting in? >> absolutely. i was in the world economicru a few days ago in davos talking to c.e.o.s and hedge fund traders and they said this cannot last, it's too good to have the market rallying day after day and to have the volatility so incredibly low. what sparked the latest selloff really was a realization on friday that we're justtarting to see the first signs of inflationary pressures creeping into the u.s. economy, anad tht left many a trader thinking,

actually, these extraiodinary cond that have been supported by cheap money from central banks, that can't go on forever. >> yang: but we've seen the employment numbers getting better, wages getting a little better and, last month, the big tax bill being passed. we knew there was going to be a lot of bongrohead. why did it suddenly come into focus now? >> well, i think there's a lot of things. one is that employment report on friday. today is theeport on the service sector doing as well as it has sinceo fievment those things altogether sugge the economy is finally experiencing a warming trend, that the gothilocks scenario that world would be forever with low interest rates and no wagoesr wall street, now we're shifting the baton to main street a bit, although i think the wages are still a hope,ie stll need sustained wage gains out there but e reality set in this is a global phenomenon. other economies are also picking up, and you're seeing other

central banks not only lift their foot off the accelerator but talking about hitting the break. this is a big scheft for what we've seen fm r in the last eight to nine years. >> yang: the selling inreased in the afternoon, slacked off a bit, atd increased again at th close. is this an indication of program tradading? >> absolutely. one of the really important things to understand is that, right now, almost all u.s. equity funds are in passive funds. it'seomputers that manage m. on any given say, about two-thir of the market can be driven by computerized trading and a lot of the com programs are set up to sell when conditions get choppy. everybody talks about self-driving ca'rs. what wseeing is self-driving markets where a lot ofomputer programs are jumping in. inned addition to this, there is a particular trade t's been incredibly unpopular for the

last few mons, trading on volatility, basically placing betsy devos that volatile is going to be carrying on in the markets. what happened in the last few hours and continuing now is a lot of the bets went badly wrong and there's a type of fund which is borrowed heavily to place these bets which is really suffering now. just as in previous market crashes and swings, we've seen some hedge funds and funds beid knoct by these peculiar movements. that's going on now and makingtr thding doubly peculiar. >> yang: diane, the u.s. markets have been very high for a while now.e has market -- the market seed to be looking for a bottom. has it found it or do you think you will see the selling pressure continue? >> it's hard to say because we are still dealing with this reality. it's interesting the reality is

feds raised the interest rates, interest rates are going higher. we have a lot ofebt treasury, going to have to issue more debt because of tax cuts to fnance the tax cuts. i think all of that coming together is important and it hits the stage forre volatility going forward. i agree that the volatility comments we heard out there that gillian pointed out are very important. what's also important is we saw no one hedging their downside. we said many were on the wrong side of the bets. people were dring without seat belt, they were confident it's always going to go up. does that mean we're done with the correction? i don't knn if i would oan island in a place that has hurricanes, but the economys solid. we're talking about a baton tht handed the baton to main street finally. that will be good forhe economy. we see self-feeding momentum out there and that's something we welcome. >> yang: lattoday the white house put out a statement ecoing

that that the long-term fund o mendelthe economy remain strong. diane swonk and gillian tett, ank you so much for joining us. >> thank you. >> yang:n the day's other news, a new, bipartisan immigration bill was floated, but president trump quickly shot it down. republican john mccain and democrat chris coons called for a pathway to citizenship for immigrants illegally brought here as children. they a security but not funding for a border wall. the president said any deathat doesn't include a wall "is a totawaste of time." rmer sports doctor larry nassar was sentenced today, for a third nal time. he was ordered to serve from 40 to 125 years in prisonor molesting girls and young women at a training club. nassar appeared in court in lansing, michigan after listening to dozens of victims spealast week. before the judge handed down the sentence to him, nassar read an apology. >> the words expressed byer

ne that has spoken, including the parents havey impacted me tonermost core.wi that being said, i understand and acknowledge that it pales in comparison to the pain, trauma, and emotions that you all are feeling. it's impossible to convey the depth and breadth of how sorry i am to each and everyone involved.as >> yang:r is 54. he's already been sentenced to up to 175 years in another sexual abuse case, and a separate 60-year term for child pornography. iope francis faces new que about his insistence that no victims of a pedophile priest in chile er came forward, to ssnounce an alleged cover-up. the associated peports the pontiff received a letter in 15 detailing "sexual and psychological abuse" by the priest and accusing a bishop of hiding it.ar juans cruz says he was a victim of the abuse, and the author of the letter.

>> to hear him say that nobody had ever approached him or let him know about this is pretty incredible. i was saddened and i couldn't believe that someone s up like the pope could lie about this. >> yang: last week, pope francis sent the catholic church's top sexual abuse investigator to chile, to look into claims about the bishop. the vatican id "new information" had emerged. in iraq, u.s. troops aregi ing to withdraw, now that baghdad has declared victory over the islamic state. an iraqi government spokesman and western contractors say american soldiers are beingsh ted to afghanistan. as of late september, some 9,000 u.s. troops were in iraq. a senior iraqi oicial says about 4,000 will be to left to train iraq's military. back in this country, jerome powell was sworn in today as the 16th chairman of the federal reserve. the former investment banker and fed board member succeeds janet

yellen. she served one term, but president trump declined to offer her a second. and, the philadelphia eagles returned home from minnesota today, with their first super bowl trophy, eve they beat the favored new england patriots last night, 41 to 3 to claim the national football league championship. we'll have a full report, later in the program. still to come on the newshour: what is computational propoganda? and how it is central to russia's infortion warfare. five months after hurricane harvey, is houston prepared for the next big flood? and much more. >> yang: the political fight ner the russia investigat rages on. democrats pushed today for the house intelligen committee to release their answer to a republican memo.

and the president traded jabs with a top democrat. white house correspondent yamiche alcindor begins our covege. >> reporter: president trump was supposed to be focused on tax cuts. instead he started his day by going after a leading critic on the russia investigation. his target: california democratg adam schiff, democrat on the house intelligence committee. in early morning tweets, the president said: "little adam schiff... is one of the biggest liars and leakers in washington."sc he also accuseff of illegally leaking confidential information. schiff fired back, saying: "instead of twting false smears, the american people would appreciate it if you turned off the tv and helped solve the funding crisis, protected dreamers or... really anything else." rtthe president made no fuher mention of schiff or the russia probe, during his visit la, r to blue ashohio. the day's dust-up followed friday's release of the nunes memo, written by republicans on the house intelligence committee.

it alleges the f.b.i. and justice department "omitted" vital information to obtain a special surveillance warrant for then-trump campaign adviser carter page. today, the house intelligence chairman, devin nunes, defended his handling of the issue: >> we enjoy the criticism. because when you're being criticized like this by all major networks, being attackedhe by teft, we know we're getting closer to the truth. >> reporter: and over the weekend, mr. trump claimed the memo is "vindication" for him in special counsel robert mller's investigation. but on sunday, sever republican lawmakers, including chris stewart of utah and trey gowdy of south carolina, thsagreed. >> i actually don'k it has any impact on the russia probe, >> this memo has frankly nothing at all to do with a special counsel. it would be a mistake for anyone to suggest that the special counsel shouldn't complete his work. >> reporter: democrats readily agreed. tor kamala harris of california:ni

>> the scance of the memos really is the disintegration really of our process. people are playing politics with our process, and when it comes to classified information, we have to understand we should not be weaponizing it, that we have >> reporter: late this afternoon, the intelligence panel met to decide whether to release the democratic rebuttal of the nunes memo. for the pbs newshour, i'm yamiche alcindor. >> yang: the attention on this nunes memo goes back two weeks even more. and there are whestions about her some of that attention, at least on social media, has been coming fr real users, or whether it's being ginned up artificially. william brangham hasore. >> brangham: in the days leading up tthe release of that controversial nunes memo, there was a hashtag on twitter called #release-the-memo that became hugely popular. it was used by conservatives and allies of the president who

hoped the memo's release would undercut special counsel robert mueller's investigation. but a series of recent reports indicate that some of those twitter accounts promoting #release-the-memo were fake, and some of them were linked to russian interests. thomas rid is at johns hopkins school for advanced international studies 's been examining how twitter andon othene platforms can be used by these so-called fake "bots" to spread information online. welcome back to the "newshour". >> hi. >> brangham: so as i was describing, the #on twitter called #release-the-memo became popular on twitter. thfe humans were releasin #because they wanted the memo to come out but allegedly some were promoted by the bots. can you explain what we know about these bots and how they might have been connectedo russia? >> so a bot is an automated twitteaccount that doesn't have a real human being behind it but just a program and, s

indeed, ems that some automated accounts and some fake real human beings that aren't actually who they petend to be use the #release-the-memo hashtag -- a hashtag is a wayo make a twitter tweet circulate more -- use that hashtag to give it some lift. really it's very difficult to distinguisbetween these real conservative activists and bliticians -- ngham: real people. -- real people and fak personas that may be linked to russian interests and that is a problem in itself. >> brangham: explain how this would actually work. for those who don't use twitterh or understand mechanics of it, basically, i choose who i want to follow, some 5 million different voices, and i get messages frm those people directly in their twitter as they tweet out messages. if i don't follow these bots, why do i care whaet they a or

are not saying? >> so, indeed, a lot of users on twitter think they don't follow any bots, an they may actually not follow any art ticial account are not human and, therefore, think that doesn't concern me, this problem. but that's not how this works. for example, imagine you see a tweet, post on twitter, and that has been retweetedr liked, thousands, tens of thousands of times. you never check whether these retweets, which make something appear very important and viral, whether they actually are real or not. so it's possible to give actual messages, like a hashtag, to give it more lift and weight through automation and through automated abuse. >> brangham: it's like fake applause for a comedian. p nts people in there to clap or laugh extra hard and it makes him seem funnier, at least to the auience, than he really might be? >> absolutely, except it's not just the specific line that the

comedian talks about that can be amped up and amplified, it can be other messages that sort of filter up very schoal out of the vastness of all the twitteri posts and twtter messages. so twitter, in fact, is a hugeh part ofis problem here. >> brangham: kellyanne conway and the white houseidave sa this wasn't about a hashtag on twitter. this was a vote in the house intelligence committee. they're e ones who released this memo. what is the evidence that exists, if any, tht this was some coordinated campaign by non-american actor >> soussia in the cold war, it was soviet, of course, inuding east germany andthers' information operation, active measures, was the term of art, always exploit exist co conflic. they employment existing cracks in our system and

>> twitter refuses to make the distinction and refuses to point out abuse, the fake bot accounts to its own users. it's impossible to, for example, opt out of bot traffic, to opt out of messages from bot and retwets from bot. >bot. >> brangham: you argue twitter could easily do that to identifk the from the real. >> exactly, that is not a big problem. twitter claims they can recognize bots automatically botsat the same time, t make itter appear larger and more engaging than it actually is twitter has never made money, and that's a way for them to appear bigger than theyy actuall are. >> brangham: thomas rid, thank you very much. .

>> reporter: so some question >> yang: next, the long roadas h back from hurricane harvey.he when the powerful storm hit thet texas cast august, it r dropped more than 50 inches of rain across houston, the most f ever recordm a single storm. harvey was responsible for atcl least 68 deaths and an estimated $125 billion in damage, makinger it the second ctliestan hurricaine in u.s. history after katrina.arha five months later, people arean ill trying to get thevess back to normal. for the next story in our series "after the storms," harito sreenivasan breaks do problems exposed by harvey'ss rising waters. >> sreenivasan: what's it l he to see yoouse like this? >> it is disturbing. i guess i've gotten used to it.n >> sasan: kathleen and nat pacini lived here, in the meyerland area of houston, onut the city's est side. but on a saturday night in later august, tn began to fall, and didn't stop until it had dropped me than four feet of water on the city. >> i came to the back door and it was rushing up the driveway

like a wave fm the bayou. >> sreenivasan: within minutes, the water was insien their hous a neighbor called and told them to get out.a they rushed three houses down to jenna and chad arnols home. they had recently raised 18 inches above ground and it became an island in the riverin that was now their neighborhood. >> honestly we just thought we were going to you know t a ttle rain. little more than usual and didn't realize it would be 50 some odd inches but wly you know we didn't feel like we needed to evacuate. we decided we werelevated. we felt safe. e decided to stay. >> sreenivasan: nolds used a sailboat and kayaks to travel back and forth between housesto rescue other neighbors andcu gather up what belongings theyha left. at one point 19 people were huddled in their home. ll i was shivering and i r think it was shock. and a feeling of helplessness as nothing in a while we were stuck there. there was nothing i could do.>do

>> sreenivasan: the pacinis had fld insurance-- living in rederally designated floodplain, they were requid to. here's how it works: the federal emergency management agency draws flood maps across the country. a 100-year floodplain, seen re in blue, means that each year there is a one in 100 chance your home will be flooded.dpth a 500-year floodplain, the area in green means one in 500, orar 0.2% chance for the area to be flooded in any year.oo if you live within these zones,h you must pe flood insurance, though it's at a government-subsidized rate. and yet, just outsid500-si year floodplain, in the city' northeast, live jackie and michael wtte. hey weren't required to have flood insurance, and yet, like tens of thousands of others, they flooded, too. >> isomething went wrong, thng maps were wrong. if you have three 500-year events in two years that must mean your 500-year definition is

wrong. >> sreenivasan: ed emmett is the harris county executive.he re called judges in texas. he's in charge of the more than 1700 square miles that 4.6 million people call home. he says the fema maps were nyearly wrong. and in fact, as s half of the flood insurance claims ter harvey came from properties ty outside ofhe flood plain. emmett says the maps need updating, because extreme ather is also becoming more common. >> i hate to use the phrase, b we have a new normal. we now have to assume that thesd f flood events can occur. >> sreenivasan: he points out that while harvey mnational diadlines as the worst flooding in u.s. history, it was by no means the first to hit this region in recent years. in 2015, 12 inches fe10 hours over memorial day.in april 2016, 15 inches fell in 24 hours, in what became known as the tax day flood. for each of these, the federal government distributed hundreds of millions of dollars in

emergency relief and aid. >> i'm not denying climate chae. i mean all you have do is look at the satellite photoof the arctic or look at glacier national park. i mean clearly something isn. going >> sreenivasaie sam brody stflooding and flood risk reduction at texas a&m.dy we're walking along the bray'ss thyou, where during harve water level was well above our w heads and into the surrounding streets. he says in addition to outdated ferod maps and changing wea patterns, the problem of flooding here has been greatly exacerbated by development. >> the normal of 10 years ago and certainly 50 years ago it's not the normal moving forward.al not just because climate is changing precip patterns or changing sea levels rising but the way we're building andhe redefining landscapes and fragmenting natural drainage

structus is a even bigger problem. >> sreenivasan: houston is the fourth largest u.s. city in terms of population, and at 627 square miles, it's larger than new york, chicago and los angeles. reporting for this series, wero drove thh seemingly endlessof miles ighways, office parks, strip malls and neighborhoods. andat keeps growing farther farther out. >> this is a fast growing area and so more and more land is being taken up by development, and it's no secret anytime you put down concrete or you put down rooftops somewhere then yo have to offset that. >> sreenivasan: the pacinis lived in meyerland, blocks fromy bayou and in a floodplain, and yet they were surprised when water entered their home. >> our house had never flooded. had no reason to think that it would flood. >> sreenivasan: harvey's rains were historic.

but sam brody says what's happening way out katy, texas, 20 miles west, where prairielands are being turned into subdivisions, full ofs roads, rooftopd sidewalks, has an effect down in houston. >> i don't want to su there would have been no flooding in harvey if we had developed differently. there was a tremendous amount of water. we're in a low-lying cstal area bayou system with poorly drined, naturally poorly drained soils.ra but the impact could have beenve erless if we had made dit decisions upstream, for exampleo >> we neeurn this area e to much more green space. sometimes you h look at mother nature and say motherra nature winser than try and >> sreenivasan: and yet, in a city famous for its lack ofer iv zoning, with indual counties acting in their own self- interest, and in a state known i for championing individual rights, that won't be easy.

the r word isn't very popular here, regulations.y. >> no it is not. now houston has always been a very free market city. it's been one of our great strengths.. >> sreenivasan: tory gattis works at theenter for opportunity urbanism, a think tank that focuses on how cities ngn encourage economic growth. he agrees that c are needed, including stricter building codes and better flood- risk disclosure. but he's also afraid of throwing the development bae out with rricane bathwater. >> iwe just start banning development in large swaths of foe region i think that could be very problematihouston's long term future. because it will affect housing w suppch will affect housing prices and affordability, and really hit the middle class and be able to afford a home. >> there is not one simple solution that many people would >> sreenivasan: sam brody says many decisions, by individual homeowners, developers, officials at the local, stateayu and federal levels, made over the course of decades, have added up to an overall increased risk of flooding for the greater houston area.ut

gettingf this mess will similarly require great coordination, and resolve. >> hurricane harvey's devastation was a surprise to a lot of people, but we've been talking about it for decades as a problem and one of my bigger worries is what happens when harvey like storm hits and 20 years from now it's going to be mat much worse because we continue to pe people in harm's way and not think about the ramifications er the longt term. >> senivasan: in our final story, we'll explore some of the solutions brody and others areme g, and who should pay for them. for thpbs newshour, i'm hari sreenivasan reporting fromor houston, texas.ro >> yang: tomon facebook at 1:00 p.m. eastern. we'll host a live discussion with the non-profit news orgazation the "texas tribun and answer your questions about hurricane harvey recovery efforts.

>> yang: stay with us, coming up on the newshour, an effort top showcase more femaleaye ights. and the philadelphia eagles finally celebrate a super bowl victory. but first, we return to the divide between the white house to talk about the political fallout aret of the currentic econo landscape is "politics monday" team, amy walter of the "cook political report" and tamara keith of npr. tam, yt me start withu. recently, you before the statee of the union dissected donald trump's speeches.ec he likes to talk about the stock market when it was going up, but today he had the very awkward situation of being live in cincinnati, giving a speech with the box in the corner on cable television showing the dow dropping, dropping, dropping. is he a risk here? >> till the cable networks cut

away entirely from his speech and just went to coverage of the dow. the interesting thing is that, up until thursday of last week, president trump was very regularly in his speeches talking about the amazing wealth growth that has happened as af result the markets since his election. afterec thursday, no more mentis of the stock market. that's the thing, talking about the stock market was never a great idea for a politician because stocks and markets are volatile and they aren't the economy. to be clear, the stock market is not the economy. today, the white house put out a statement essentially say just that, that the stock markec is not the economy, the fundamtals remain strong, which is true, that job growthh has been strong and wages even grew quite significantly in the last month.. >> yang: political per talking about the markets?? >> tam summed it up. that's the danger, that's why

every economist and political ut a lotells you don't of stock in the stock market in terms of a talking point. >>ang: i see whou did there. >> the issue really, now, for 2018 is the state of the economy. how do people feel abt the the economy, and do they feel as if the tax cuts republica say has been part of the reason for the recovery of the economy as well as thery deregulat efforts, do voters give them credit for those, do theyive the president credit for the improving economy? right now the country, not surprisingly, is pretty divided on thi, you have more voters than not saying they believe it's barack obama's economy, right?, he should get more credit than trump although that has been narrowing. on the issue of taxes and whether that is playing a role, the country, again, is not quite parttvinced that that is of the debate.te they are still split on whetherr the tax cuts are a good or bad thing. they believthe economy is doing much better, but, again,

very polarized.ri you ask democrats ho the economy is doing, they are not as optimistic as republicans t abo economy. so your views on the economy, different depending on your partisan standing, and they also are different from youriew of the president and of republicans.t' >> yang: talk about the tax plan. there was an. monmouth universiy poll. we have some numbers. in december t disapproval was 47% approve 26. the president i out there in todaythe tax plan a over the weekend house speak paul ryan got a little blowback on twitter for touting -- ae schooletary, i think, it was, ut ting a $1.50 a week benefit from this tax cut. will this help or hurt in the midterms some. >> that tweet was not a gre anecdote. that tweet is not how they want to be selling this tax plan.

however, the president -- i mean, today, is no a great example because he went very far f script whi out trying to sell the tax plan, but republicans believehat their path in 2018 is a strong economy, thatyheir abil to sort of overcome the typical thing that happens in a mid-term year, which ishat they'll just get wiped out, their path to overcoming that is selling this tax plan, having people believe that it's workingor them,nd selling it in a way that democrats in 2009 didn't really sell the stimulus.th you know, by the end of 2009, most peopl believe that the taxes had gone up, even though they had a tax cut in the o nottus, and republicans want to make that same mistake.e >> yang: they're obviously out there pushing this siill.ll this key to the republicans for the midterms?

>> absolutely they are countg on the optimism americans have about the country. the challenge is person who is supposed to do the sell ag a-- has certainly promoted himself as one of the best salesman of all time is not particularly a disciplined salesperson. number, two views of the tax plan line up pittyctly with your views on president trump. the reason that you saw those numbers climb in that poll that you showed from monmouth, you also should show that the president's approval rating rose from december until this month. so, if you like the presidentsi right now, you will like the tax plan. if you don't like the president, you don't like the tax plan or are undecided on the tax plan, and that's the group of voters now both sides are fightingr.in ov

in fact, democrats, too, are a little bit concerned. now, a lot of democrats wereoc convinced when this vote was hawepening that they going to be able to cast this as a corporate-only plan that was going to hurt theeat class. now that you have the economy doi well, bonusesre going out to people, and whether it's $1.50 or $200 coming back, that's a very good message for republicans to sell.o i'm hearing nowrom some democrats who worry, no, we need to do what republicans did in 2009 and 2010 t obamacare, which is to continue to put it in a negative light and make our meaging stick young tam, today the house voted unanimously to release the democratic response to the nunes memo. it now goes to president trump who has to decide whether or not he wants todeclassify that. is there pressure on him, having said he's doing this in terms of ansparency, to release and declassify the democrats' memo well?

>> there is absolutely a pressure on him, and he hasth a five-day deadline, just likehet with republican memo. the president has said that the republican memo vindicated him. he has been just talking up this memo, loving th mo, and really taking hits at the democrats on the committee. so it'going to betough for him to want to declassify it. but the white house insists it will behr reviewedgh the same process. the question is, the republican memo was fully declassified, no redactions. what will the democratic memo look like in five dayif they agree to let bit released?se >> yang: less than 30 seconds.. i think fundamentally we'll find outll maybe in a couple ofe weekser this was another party skirmish which there havet been plenty of within this committee, or whether we're having a substantive move hereer and a real break between thee republicans and president on this issue.su >> yang: amy walter, tamerar, keith, thanks for being here. >> you're welcome.

>> yang: turning from the political theater of washington to the dramatic stage.o almost two dozen theaters around . are producing the second.c women's voices theater festival. jeffrey brown sat down with tothree of the playwright discuss why this effort is meaningful, particularly now. >> brown: a play about a young american moving with her family to nigeria in the 1960s, by caleen sinnette jennings. >> what's wrong with this. auntie gave it to me, she bought it in london.n. >> as progressive as theatre is in many ways in the united states, there's still somethingg around the edges that says women's stories are maybe more precious, less edgy, less intellectually challenging, there's sort of an ugly cloud

that hangs over it, and i thinkk this is a way to dispel all of those notions. >> brown: a 17th century comedy becomes a story of rich and pooe inca today, in the hands of playwright theresa rebeck. >> the fact is, women do tell stories in a different way and e ere are mighty stories out there waiting told. i don't believe that playwritine is on a y chromosome. none of us believe that, rit?on >> brown: a pe historyl that's also an unsettling piece of american and cherokee tribal history, by mary kathryn nagle. today women face rates of domestic r violence and sexual assault higher than a other

part of the population in the united state >> part of dehumanizing a people is silencinthem, and i think the more women's stories aret told on stage, the more oure culture will start to shift. it's noa coincidence that weat face such high rates of domestic violence and sexual assault and at the samtime our voices have not been presented on the americ stage. >> brown: these are just threed of the plays aywrights of the "women's voices theater festiva" a month-long, 24- theater project now underway in washington, d.c., with all new plays, including 13 worldal premieres. it's the second such festival here, the first held in 2015, and the largest of its kind inou the cry. and it's taking direct aim at a fact of life in american theater: the paucity of productions by female writers; around a quarter of plays across the country, according to several studies.ev at arena stage, one of the originating companies heading the festival, i talked with three women whose work is on display.

caleen sinnette jennings, a professor of theater at american university, took part in the first festival. she's back with a sequel to her earlier play, both based on her own life. the new one is titled "queens girl in africa." >> it's semi-biographic, a sora nobody else could tell the story, buthat's important ist the fact that the story is wort telling, and the story is worth seeing. i think, particularly women of g eration wrestled with that thought, and it's good to see younger women coming alongin saying, why is this even a question?io ofourse your story is wort telling, now more than ever, so >> brown: are you surprised, that it's still a thing? that there would be a need for a festival of women's voices?> tiw >> no, beuse racism is still here, sexism is still here, everything is still here, justth wearing difrent clothes. er, it's all here. >> brown: pulitzrize-nominee theresa rebeck, a veteran of

television and film as well as the stage, decided to re- an english restoration-era comedy, "the way of the world," written bywilliam congreve. >> if you're hideous looking --! you're n >> it's not like i looked at that play and said, i want to do ke feminist retelling of t congreve play. but there is no mistaking that a woman wrote it, that i inhabit the female characters in a completely different way than what congreve did. point of view is one of the tools you have as a writer, andt this is the point of v the woman. it's not an agenda, it's the truth. if our agenda is always to tell the truth, the truth out of a woman's mouth is going to sound different than the truth out of a man's.at >> brown: maryyn nagle, an enrolled citizen of the cherokee nati, also advocates full ti on behalf of tribal rights as a lawyer. her play, "sovereignty" presents another window into that world,

and is set in the past-- andrewe kson is one of the characters-- and in the present day supreme court. andrew jackson's efforts have been good >> when anyone tells me that some plays are political and some are not,ink it's all political. we can say it's just art, but i think we're political bein h,ut we'ans, right, and i don'tan see any art in this world as apolitical. it affects our lious in such pr ways and getting to see that on stage is exciting. >> brown: do you think ofr t yourself as a woman playwright?s >> i do, yes, and i also think of myself as a cherokee playwright. i and i think the combination is terribly exciting. d new, right? >> i have to say , when i was ju starting out as a playwright, like ages ago, i had a mentor who ught me, who said to me "you've got to be careful

not to let them categorize you as a woman playwright," heort of said, as a kindly meant advice. and i, in my youth i was like, "i am a woman and i am a playwrightso it's unclear to me why that would be something i need to be careful about." >> brown: during the recententh wom marches, close to 100 theaters in more than 30 states hosted readings of new works by women. the washington, d.c. festival was planned well before thenn explosion of the #metoo movement. i asked the playwrights if they were surprised by recent events. >> art mirrors reality, and we are in an extraordinary time in our history, something major happed in our lastrtdi inauguration, and i think this groundswell comes from that. so i think theater has often challenged the norms and the artists he stepped up and led ate wave of change, but it's not

surprising to me his is happening now.e, >> all these women comingst forward wities, it doesn't surprise me that the stories exist.s i knew they existed, i've donest work >> yeah, we all knew. >> we all knew. >> people saying "we didn't know!" right, that's shocking, the pele who claim they didn't know, that's shocking to me and in fact, thankfully i think a lot of men are now coming forward to say, well, i knew, but you know, how could i take down this man in power, because my career was depending upon him accepting me.n i don't understand why this doesn't feel better, and i think that must be because i don't sbelieve that real change coming. >> brown: on this issue of how hard it is just to make it as a rdaywright-- how hard is it? >> it's really n:> i've been through so many ups and downs that they finally, the drama guild, they do a little magazine, and they put me on the cover of the issue about surval.pu i was like, "i am the poster child of survival!"

>mebrown: what do you hope from this festival? >> i think there is, "oh, it's a and i hope this model will be replicated all oveeathe country. r is also a very important l ace because you hold twoant so, yes, we are e same. yes, we're incredibly different. but that difference need not frighten you, that difference need nobe a mystery, thatbe difference should be something you walk towards in order to build that empathy. >> brown: the womences theater festival runs through february 15. for the pbs newshour, i'm frey brown in washingto d.c. >> yang: finally, super bowl is now in the books and the

philadelphia eagles have their first nfl championship since 1960, before the super bowl wasl created, after beating e new england patriots. >> for the philadphia eagles,t . >> yang: it was a victory w decades in the making. the underdog eagles ed in front of the reigning champio patriots, right from the start. just before halftime, they added to their lead with a trick play, a touchdown pass to quarterback nick foles. foles also threw for three scores, making him the first player in n.f.l. history to both throw and catch a super bowl touchdown. then, with two mites to go and the eags up 38-33, tom brady was sacd and fumbled, shredding the patriots' hopes for a late comeback, and a record-tying sixth championship.

the eagles added a field goal to win 41 to 33. it was an improbable victorys after starting quarteack carson wentz was sidelined by a knee injury in december. >> to be a part of the philadelphia eagles first championship, we've all waited a long time, to be in thisc and i know there's gonna be a lot of celebr>>ing tonight. ang: even as foles spoke in minnesota... >> e-a-g-l-e-s!erlee >> yang: ...the celebrating began in philadelphia, as thousands flooded broad street. gravity was no match for determined fans who climbed light poles, even though police had slathered them in grease.d some even to live out the eam's fight song, "fly, eagles,y f," diving off awnings. d ry parade is set for v thursday. we are now joined by bob ford, an award-winning sports columnist for the "philadelphiar inquirer" and the "philadelphia daily news."

he's in minneapolis, where the game was played last night. bob, thanks for joining us. j what does this mean for phis delphia? this city with a storied tradition in football, but not a lot of trophies. >> yeah, they have wide aspirations an narrow trophy cases in fissley and, as you suggested, thest previous championship for the eagles wasa in the month of the eisenhower administration, six years beforeon the super bowl ea even began, and here they are in the 52nd super bowl finally2n breaking through. so it's fair to say a certain amount of civic iatience had taken root over that time and, as i said, to finally break throh with the sup bowl championship means an awful lot and the city is very happy today. >> yang: a lot of people may not realizhe story of nick foles, the quarterback who led

the eagles to this victory. he's been a bkup for a lon time and actually contemplated retiring not too long ago. >> yes, he was original drafted in 2012 by the eagles. not a high draft phek. as taken in the third round, 88th overall, but i can guarantee you none of the 87 ahead of him were m.v.p. of the super bowl last night. he had a bounce around care at the very start with the eagles. he got a little chance to be the number one guy, did well for a season, chip kelly, the then coach, thought he wanted to go in another direction, he wanted a mobile quarterback. nick i not necessarily that. he was traded to the rams, didt well, lost as a starter, lost the j. was a backup and to the chefs next year and contue prated retirement. he said i think i just might hang it up, this is not why i got into football.al

he was lured back to thegl es by a friend who coached before when he was with the eagles. he said ll give it another chance. he said this is a place where i could at least enjoy theaname the people. there was p certainly no idea he was going to become a startingin quarterback again. eagles have a fine young quarterback, second year player carson wince, but december 10 he tore his acl and suddenly nick foles was in the spotlight again. >> yang: and i heard the eagles playoff hopes or supere bowl hopes died when carson went out. the sumples because carson was an enormous part of positionio eagles to have a post season run. he had a wonderful season. perhaps a most valuable player ality season. nick, as we know, had a very spotty mystery and no one thoughte would be the kind of guy who would be able to pick up the team and carry them in t way carson wince had, but i

guss we were all in for a bit of surprise.ri >> yang: now you have a quarterback who led his team to the super bowl championship and is likely not going to be the starting quarterback next year. >> that's an oddms cirnce the m.v.p. doesn't have a starting job the next seaso but carter will come back from the acl news surgery, it's expected he had been lack at the the start of the season, nick ll be back on the sideline and wearing a baseball cap and plauding. he's under contract to the eagles. if they want to keepim, they can. hetdzent have a lot of choice there. but it is an odd circumstance for someone who did what he did last night insu thr bowl. >> i guess the victoryas fitting because they were not favored. they were going up against a team that had b won the superlbo a number of times. does it fit with sort of the underdog mentality of philadelphia sports?or >> yes, and it fits also with the city's perceived persona as

that sort of rocky characternc ng up against, you know, the bigger foe. when you look at the new england patriots and tombrady and bill belichick, they had become a t monolith n.f.l., won five super bowls in 17 years, this is a time you don't beatl lig so i think people do like that wart of thing and it fits in with thethe city feels about itself. it's stuck between the glitz of new york and theof power of washington and the snootiness of boston and where does philadelphia fit into that scheme? they have to be thebl-collar underdog. so this wasu a pretty good outcome for them. hey wear that coat pretty well. >> yang: big night forph iladelphia, bob ford, philadelphia inquirer, philadelphia.com and thean philadelphia daily news.ws thanks for being with us. >> my pleasure, john. >> yang: a news update before wo actor john mahoney has died. he was best known for his rolen as the fathere tv show "frasier."

mahoney was also in the films "moonstruck" and "sathing," among others. he was 77 years old.. on the newshour online, the 2018 winter games open friday in pyeongchang, but you can test your olympic knowledge .oght now by taking a quiz onig our web site, p/newshour. d that's the newshour for tonight. i'm john yang. join us online and again hererr to evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you and see you soon. > major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> babbel. a language app that teaches real-life conversations in a new language. ap >> consumer cellular.

>> and by the alfred at sloan foundn. supporting science, technology, and improved economic performance and financ literacy in the 21st century. t . >> supported by the johne . and cather macarthur foundation. committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. usce information at macfound.org >> and with the ongoing support of ese institutions e utns >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers ou. thank you.am cti y nk y. captioning sponsored by newshour productis, llc captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.orgby gwendolyn: on this week history detectives:

what does this medaleveal about a top secret american militaryroject or during war ii? elyse: what can this pennant tell us about one woman's role at a crucial point in the women's suffrage movement? tukufu: and in an encore presentation, what can this curious artwork tell us about the beginnings of some of our most beloved cartoon characters? so what you're telling me is that buddy was going head-to-head with mickey mouse! elvis costello: ♪ watchin' thdetectives ♪ i get so angry when the teardrops start ♪ ♪ b he can't be wounded 'cause he's got no heart ♪ ♪ watchin' the detectives ♪ it's just like watchin' the detectives ♪ ♪ watchin' the detectives